I don't understand calling both GIMP's and Blender's GUIs clumsy just because they take diffrent approach and not copy Photoshop/3DMAX's menus verbatim. I use GIMP alot and quite used to it's interface. I guess people coming from a PS background find it clumsy.

Anyways, some additions to the pixelart list (I found those while looking for alternatives to pixen on linux):

Ultimate Unwrap 3D is an affordable program which mainly does UV mapping for 3D models, although my favourite thing about it is it can convert nearly any model format to any other format pretty much perfectly.

3D World Studio is the Worldcraft / Hammer clone that I use to mode buildings and other non-organic stuff. I'll have to check out DelEd though, never heard of it and it looks awesome...

A low to medium mesh modeller. The interface may seem quite clumsy, especialy to windows users.

It would be nice if these two weren't so damn biased. Blender's interface is fine and is exceptionally efficient when you actually take the time to learn it. Same with Wings. They both take two completely different approaches to creating 3d art.

Also, blender has a pile of features that many of the high-end commercial modellers (Maya, 3ds max, lightwave) either do not have or are just starting to implement (Fully built in scripting language (Max has this, but the others do not), LSCM unwrapping and the built in game engine are a few biggies that immediately come to mind.), so saying it is "years behind" is just straight up false. True, the mesh tools could use some work, and a few other things here and there, but aside from that, it's a fairly serious modern 3d package.

Blender has changed a LOT since even a year ago. Development has been going at a blitzkrieg-like pace, with major releases every 4 months or so. If you haven't checked it out in awhile, i'd recommend doing so.

"ChibiTracker is a portable IT (Impulse Tracker) clone. It is not a 100% clone though, as it adds more features, such as chorus and reverb, stereo samples, an advanced sample editor and more. The user interface also presents some changes, as it can be custom themed and resized.ChibiTracker is Open Source Software under the GNU Public License, and it can be run under Windows, Mac-OS, Linux, FreeBSD, BeOS, and more to come."

Another great alternative to modplug for those that prefer the IT interface.

I'm coming from a Klik & Play / Multimedia Fusion background. I know the programs in and out, and I know and understand why certain bugs exist on a very basic programming level. The only scripting programming I've ever done is HTML, which doesn't count, and CSS, which is pretty much the same thing.

As far as music recording goes, I have yet to hear electronic versions of real instruments which sound remotely like the real thing, and I have yet to hear software replacements of some hardware effects, such as compressors or pre-amps, which have the same response as their hardware counterparts.

Some software reverb effects which are impulse response based sound pretty great, and I enjoy certain synthesizers a lot, but in my experience, you're not going to get a particularly good sound for anything besides strictly electronic music with only a computer and software, and even then genuinely useful music software is going to set you back at least a few hundred dollars -- that includes multitrackers with a decent feature set.

Also, I'm surprised no one has brought up ZBrush for 3D work. I've found it to be one of the more intuitive modelling programs available. Particularly, it's capacity for generating normal and displacement maps is extremely useful, as they're very difficult to get right by hand.

I've never used XNA, but it looks to me a bit like Microsoft's apology for slowly shifting DirectX into it's current state of COM-oriented hell. I would be extremely reticent to recommend anyone use an API which is so strongly tied to Microsoft's platforms, especially when free alternatives such as SDL and OpenGL are still easier to use, are just as powerful and are largely platform independant.

Of course, Microsoft's support for OpenGL is famously poor (funny how that is), but extensions are commonly available which support even fancy-pants recent 3D effects like geometry shaders.

Also, I'm surprised no one has brought up ZBrush for 3D work. I've found it to be one of the more intuitive modelling programs available. Particularly, it's capacity for generating normal and displacement maps is extremely useful, as they're very difficult to get right by hand.

I think the spirit of this thread was geared more towards free to very cheap dev tools. I get the feeling $500 is probably out of the range for a lot of the people here. If you already have a 3D package and an extra $500 to spend, then absolutely, Zbrush would be an invaluable complimentary app.

Because I have not seen it mentioned on the thread already, there is Tile Studio, a tile and map editor, geared towards gaming (you can handle the map generation routines and such). The best grid I have seen for a tile editor (I have not used many, though ), and its free.

AdsynDX is an additive synthesis program for Windows that lets you create your own sounds and export them as .WAVs. The license appears to be some sort of honor system shareware - the site says you're supposed to pay after 15 days of use, but the software doesn't stop working and there doesn't seem to be any disabled features. Since you're working with sinusoidal wavs and various varieties of noise, anything you make will be very... synth-y. So, uh, yeah. It's of limited use, but if you're really into bleeps and bloops (especially if your aesthetic aim screws retro/arcadey) it's really handy.

Programming IDE:Eclipse www.eclipse.orgYou can use it with any language (Actionscript, Java, c/c++, Python, etc...)

(I know this thread's a bit old, but...)I happen to use Eclipse a lot, and find it to be pretty darn good. When I have to do work in Java, hands down I use this IDE. The C/C++ interface I find a bit unwieldy in Windows (the plugin assumes a GNU-ish toolchain by default), but it still does the job. In addition, there's the benefit of it being extensible via a plugin interface.The biggest downside I see so far is that the framework is definitely geared towards Java, so there are a few features that are lacking or needs improvement with the other languages. *shakes fist at the C/C++ indexer*

Whenever I start an SDL project, I use the GP2X Development Kit (DEVCPP + SDL). You just download it, start a new SDL project and you already have a barebone for your game (SDL initialization, event loop and those things). It's for Windows and Linux, and of course the GP2X, and free...

The first version (1.1) is still freeware, and its the best version in my opinion, as it contains the collab feature; like a shared canvas you can use to draw with a friend.Top notch, i totally recommend people looking for version 1 instead (free). It also has the "event" play, wich basically records all of your progress while you are drawing, and lets you replay it on the program, that way you can see how other people work, its fantastic!

In fact, i propose we create a "event" and a collab thread here in tigs, those would be awsome...did i mention v 1.1 is free :D ?

EDIT: Oh, and heres a link to a safe version, and theres also a nifty little web app in that page, so you can host canvas sessions with more ease http://www.warpaint.se/?s=download anyone want to OC for a while ? :D